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Babcock was executive secretary of the National Woman’s Party (NWP) between 1938 and 1945 and Hurlburt worked with the Michigan branch of the NWP between 1936 and 1947. The bulk of this collection consists of Babcock’s papers concerning her work for suffrage, including work with the Women's Political Union; her opposition to capital punishment; her work for world government and peace with the Women's Peace Union of the Western Hemisphere and other organizations; her work with the NWP (1924-1948), including correspondence, papers about the ERA, and extensive documentation of the lawsuit and split in the NWP; and correspondence and other papers of Harriot Stanton Blatch and Elinor Byrns.
Born in New York City in 1921, Barron began her career in the federal government in 1955 at the U.S. Army Natick (Mass.) Research and Development Command, where she eventually became a program analyst. In 1968 she helped establish the Federal Women's Program there, becoming its manager in 1974. She was later North Atlantic Equal Opportunity Program Manager for the National Park Service. An active member of the Business and Professional Women's Clubs, Barron campaigned for the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment in Massachusetts and in 1977 was elected chair of the Massachusetts Coordinating Committee for the National Observance of International Women's Year. She retired from the federal government in 1985.
This collection consists of 26 audiotaped interviews conducted by Janet K. Boles between January and May 1974 with state legislators and groups of supporters and opponents of the ERA in Texas, Illinois, and Georgia. Boles is the author of The Politics of the Equal Rights Amendment: Conflict and the Decision Process (1979), one of the first books to examine state ratification of the ERA.
Kathy Bonk was coordinator of the National Organization for Women's Media Task Force. In 1988 she founded the Communications Consortium Media Center, a nonprofit organization helping other organizations use communications strategies for policy change. Series II of this collection contains correspondence, reports, printed material, photographs, clippings, etc., concerning media coverage of NOW's activities, particularly the Equal Rights Amendment campaign. Included are correspondence, invoices, and photographs concerning the print and television advertisements produced by NOW for the ERA campaign.
The National Organization for Women (NOW) is the largest organization of feminist activists in the United States and works to bring about equality for all women. Boston NOW is one of hundreds of chapters throughout the U.S. The members of Boston NOW have played a key role in shaping public discourse and policy in Massachusetts through political and legislative activities. They work to educate the public through rallies, forums, workshops, and demonstrations. Boston NOW brings a feminist voice and vision to a wide variety of issues addressing the economic, political, social, and personal dynamics that affect women's everyday lives. The organization worked for the passage of the federal Equal Rights Amendment (1972), for its ratification in Massachusetts (1973), and for passage of the state ERA (1977) and its implementing legislation.
A feminist and long-time activist with the National Organization for Women (NOW) and the Feminist Majority Foundation, Virginia A. "Toni" Carabillo joined NOW in 1966 and one year later helped found the California chapters. She served as president of the Los Angeles Chapter of NOW (1968-1970, 1980-1982), was a member of NOW’s national Board of Directors (1968-1977), served as a national Vice President (1971-1974), and chaired NOW’s National Advisory Committee (1975-1977). She was also the director (ca. 1980) of the NOW Equal Rights Amendment Countdown office in Los Angeles during the final ratification drive. Judith Kay Meuli, an activist in NOW since 1967, met Carabillo at a meeting of NOW in 1967. Carabillo was president of the newly founded Los Angeles NOW and needed someone to run for secretary; Meuli volunteered. They were soon in a political partnership – and relationship – that lasted from 1968 until Carabillo’s death in 1997.
An active member of the National Organization for Women, Mary Jean Collins was Midwest Regional Director (1970-1972), president and executive director of Chicago NOW (1978-1980), and co-director of the NOW equal rights (ERA) campaign. A member of the National Board, she was in charge of task forces (1972-1975), and she also served as National Action vice-president, focusing on lesbian and minority women's rights as well as reproductive choice and pay equity.
The Committee to Ratify the Massachusetts State Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) was created in the summer of 1975 to replace the Massachusetts State ERA Coalition and raise money for the ratification campaign in the November 1976 referendum. After the ERA was passed, the Committee became the ERA Implementation Project, which lobbied for legislation to reconcile existing laws with the ERA. The Women's Rights Project was begun in 1977 to litigate in areas where legislative efforts failed.
A fervent supporter of the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) and of abortion rights, Crisp was an active member of the Republican Party, first on the local and then on the national level, for over twenty years. In 1977, she was elected co-chair of the Republican National Committee and served until 1980. At the 1980 Republican Convention, she spoke out against the platform committee’s decision to oppose the ERA and also protested the party's opposition to the federal funding of abortion.
This collection contains correspondence, notes, minutes, task force records, and memorabilia relating to Cunningham's work as a member of the Eastern Massachusetts chapter of the National Organization for Women (NOW), including efforts regarding the Equal Rights Amendment.
Hailed by Betty Friedan as the "midwife to the birth of the women's movement," East served as a staff member on President Kennedy's Commission on the Status of Women, 1962-1963; executive secretary of the Interdepartmental Committee on the Status of Women and the Citizens' Advisory Council on the Status of Women, 1963-1974; and deputy coordinator of the secretariat for the National Committee for the Observance of International Women's Year, 1975-1976. After her retirement in 1977, East began a new career as a full-time activist, working for the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment in Virginia and nationally, serving as the women's issues coordinator in the John Anderson presidential campaign (1979-1980), as legislative director of the National Women's Political Caucus (1983-1986), and as a board member of the National Organization for Women's Legal Defense and Education Fund (1979-1983).
A lawyer employed by the federal government, Eastwood was active in the formation of the National Organization for Women (NOW); a board member of Human Rights for Women (HRW), an organization formed in 1968 to help finance sex discrimination litigation and research projects on women's issues; and a member of Federally Employed Women (FEW), a group that sought an end to sex discrimination in the federal government.
Feminist, activist, and author Betty Goldstein Friedan helped found the National Organization for Women and served as its first president (1966-1970). Her first book, The Feminine Mystique, was published in 1963. Afterward, Friedan quickly became a leading advocate for change in the status of women in the United States. Her subsequent books include It Changed My Life (1976), The Second Stage (1981), and The Fountain of Age (1993). Friedan advocated for the Equal Rights Amendment through her work with NOW and debated Phyllis Schlafly about the issue.
Georgia Fuller was appointed co-coordinator of the National Organization for Women's Ecumenical Task Force on Women and Religion in 1976. In the early 1980s, she was part of a group of women from the Arlington, Virginia, area who participated in a series of high profile protests in order to advance the Equal Rights Amendment.
In 1943, Granger established the American branch of the St. Joan's Society, an organization of Catholic women interested in equal rights. She fought for the right of women to serve on juries and was a public advocate of the Equal Rights Amendment, supporting it before it was adopted by the platform committees of both political parties. Other organizations in which she played an active role include the Maryland chapter of the National Woman's Party, the Maryland chapter of American Women in Radio and Television, and the Women's Association of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra.
She joined the National Organization for Women (NOW) in 1975 and served as recording secretary, newsletter editor, chapter delegate to national NOW conferences, and president of the Midland, Michigan, NOW chapter. In 1987, she began working for national NOW, serving as Legislative Liaison (1987-1989), Chapter and State Development Director (1989-2005), and Organizational Development Director (2005-2007). In 2007 Hays left NOW to start Organizational Chemistry, a resource for small non-profits, chapters of larger national groups, independent organizations, or small progressive businesses seeking to improve their productivity, structure, or day-to-day function.
Ireland was a feminist activist, lawyer, and president of the National Organization for Women. In 1980, she was elected as a representative to the National NOW Board, and in 1983 she became chair of Florida NOW’s lesbian rights task force and a member of the internal structure review committee. In 1985, she managed Eleanor Smeal’s successful campaign for the NOW presidency and chaired the national NOW by-laws committee. In spring 1987, Ireland was elected executive vice-president and national treasurer of NOW. In 1989, she developed NOW's Project Stand Up for Women, an initiative to defend women's access to abortion, and worked as the national coordinator. She continued this work after her election as NOW’s president in December 1991. Early in her presidency, Ireland led NOW in organizing the March for Women’s Lives and initiated the Elect Women for Change campaign to bring a record number of women to political office. She also worked to forge links with other social justice and civil rights groups and was the prime architect of NOW’s Global Feminist Program.
A social worker, suffragist, and socialist (Wells College, B.A. 1897), Kitchelt worked in settlement houses in Rochester, NY, New York City, and New Haven, CT. She was Citizenship Director of the Connecticut League of Women Voters, executive director of the Connecticut League of Nations Association (1924-1944), chairman of the Connecticut Committee for the Equal Rights Amendment (1943-1956), and a published author.
A freelance writer and editor, Lucy Komisar was vice president for public relations for the National Organization for Women (1970-1971) and also served on the Compliance Committee. She was the author of The New Feminism (1972), Down and Out in the USA: A History of Social Welfare (1973), and Corazon Aquino: The Story of a Revolutionary (1987).
Priscilla Marie Tremper Leith attended Vassar College (BA, 1956), worked as an accountant and a journalist, and was active in feminist political organizations in Massachusetts. Leith was president of Massachusetts NOW in 1977, and served as treasurer of the Massachusetts Women's Political Caucus. She campaigned for the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment in Massachusetts and nationally.This collection includes correspondence, notes, fliers, pamphlets, reports, and scrapbooks documenting the campaign to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment in Massachusetts, North Carolina, and nationwide.
Lutz was a member of the national council of the National Woman's Party (NWP) and literature chairman and contributing editor of Equal Rights, the NWP's official organ. She was also an active member of the Massachusetts branch of the NWP. The primary goal of the NWP was passage of an Equal Rights Amendment to the U.S. constitution; it also worked on other women's rights issues.
A writer, lecturer, educator, and feminist (Wellesley, B.A. 1900, M.A. 1903), Marks was a professor of English literature at Mount Holyoke College (1901-1939) and chairman of the New York State branch of the National Woman's Party (1942-1947). This collection consists of the official files, correspondence, and printed material of the New York State branch of the National Woman's Party. It documents the relation between the branch and the national council, funding problems, ERA lobbying efforts, and the 1947 split in the NWP over goals.
The National Organization for Women (NOW) is the largest organization of feminist activists in the United States and works to bring about equality for all women. The Massachusetts Chapter (Mass. NOW) was organized in early 1973 as a way to link and support the activities of all local chapters in the state. It mobilizes people to fight for women's rights and to end violence against women, lobbies the state legislature, advocates before government agencies, and organizes public demonstrations for a broad range of issues that reflect the diversity of women in Massachusetts. Mass. NOW also distributes educational materials and supports "pro-women" political candidates.
Priscilla "Pat" Chase Matsumiya studied psychology at Pembroke College in Providence, Rhode Island, graduating summa cum laude (A.B. 1937). In 1976 she became the Coordinator for the Cambridge Committee to Ratify the Equal Rights Amendment, arranging fundraising efforts such as t-shirt and button sales as well as planning informational events and rallies for voters.
The letters to the editor of Ms. magazine, most by women, describe personal experiences and problems or praise, criticize, or suggest new departures for the magazine. Many express feminist or anti-feminist views or make statements about such issues as sexuality, medicine, human and family relationships, motherhood, life choices, credit, job discrimination, careers, or the Equal Rights Amendment. See also Letters to Ms. (MC 568).
After graduating from Hunter College (1933), Murray held a variety of jobs; employers included the Works Progress Administration and the Workers' Defense League. She entered Howard University Law School in the fall of 1941, graduated in 1944, and completed graduate studies at the University of California, Berkeley. In the late 1940s she opened a law office in New York City, where she worked until she was hired as an associate attorney in the law offices of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton, and Garrison in 1956. In the 1960s Murray was a university professor and administrator in the United States and in Ghana, served on a study committee for the President's Commission on the Status of Women, and earned a J.D.S. from Yale Law School.
The National Organization for Women (NOW) was formed on June 30, 1966, during the Third National Conference of Commissions on the Status of Women in Washington, D.C. The Statement of Purpose declares that "the time has come to confront, with concrete action, the conditions that now prevent women from enjoying the equality of opportunity and freedom of choice which is their right, as individual Americans, and as human beings." At their organizing conference (October 29, 1966), participants established task forces on education, employment, the role of women in the family, women’s political rights, and images of women in the media. As membership increased, the organization addressed more issues, including a "war on poverty," the Equal Rights Amendment, child care, abortion rights, sexual harassment, women in government, women and religion, and violence against women.
This collection consists of NOW chapter newsletters from the United States and affiliates in France, Germany, and the Philippines. The newsletters, which vary greatly in length and substance, provide a window into social and political issues relevant to local groups of women across the country. Newsletter topics include information and positions on national, state, and local legislation (e.g., Equal Rights Amendment, reproductive rights, employment issues, etc.); upcoming events (demonstrations, rallies, fundraising activities, etc.); summaries of meetings and task force activities; lists of officers (and occasionally, numbers and names of members); coalitions with other groups; etc.
A labor organizer, union official, and socialist, Newman, an immigrant from Lithuania and a factory worker when very young, was the first woman organizer for the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union, Director of Health Education at its Union Health Center, and an active member of the National and New York Women's Trade Union League. She represented the ILGWU and the WTUL at numerous committees and conferences on the state, national, and international levels. After 1924 she lived usually with Frieda S. Miller; together they raised Miller's adopted daughter. Her articles reflect her support of protective legislation, equal pay, improved working conditions, and the minimum wage, as well as her opposition to the Equal Rights Amendment.
This collection is digitized. Visit the finding aid for the Alice Paul collection (Call#: MC 399) for access to the digitized content.
A Quaker, lawyer, and lifelong activist for women's rights, Alice Paul was appointed chair of the Congressional Committee of the National American Woman Suffrage Association in 1912. In June 1916, following a clash between advocates of a federal amendment and proponents of a state-by-state approach, Paul founded the National Woman's Party, its sole plank a resolution calling for immediate passage of the federal amendment guaranteeing the enfranchisement of women. After the ratification of the suffrage amendment in 1920, the NWP began a long battle to end all legal discrimination against women in the United States and to raise the legal, social, and economic status of women around the world. The Equal Rights Amendment, as written by Paul in 1923, was first introduced in Congress in December of that year.
Social reformer Frances Perkins was the first woman appointed to the United States Cabinet. She graduated from Mount Holyoke College (1902), was a teacher and a volunteer for social organizations, and worked for various agencies concerned with labor issues before being appointed Secretary of Labor by Franklin D. Roosevelt (1933). This collection includes a typed letter from 1945 to Congressman Zebulon Weaver regarding the Equal Rights Amendment.
Pickering was the founding president of Connecticut NOW (1971-1973) and New London NOW (1968-1971), and served on NOW's national board from 1973 to 1975. She was instrumental in the passage of the Connecticut Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) and advocated for the passage of the national ERA as president of Conn ERA and chair of NOW's Resources for the ERA committee.
Attorney and feminist Marguerite Rawalt was active in the National Organization for Women and chair of its legal committee (1966-1969), founder and treasurer of the NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund, and an attorney for and president of the Women's Equity Action League. She was a lawyer for the Bureau of Internal Revenue (1933-1965) and during her tenure there served as president of the National Association of Women Lawyers (1942-1943) and of the Federal Bar Association (1943-1944). She was the first woman president of the FBA and the first woman sent to the ABA's House of Delegates (1943). In 1961 she was appointed to the President's Commission on the Status of Women and subsequently served on other commissions, such as the Citizens' Advisory Council on the Status of Women and the District of Columbia Commission on the Status of Women. She was active in the movement to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment and was a founding member of Women United and the ERA Ratification Council.
Rupp and Taylor conducted interviews with women who played significant roles in the American women's rights movement as research for their book Survival in the Doldrums: The American Women's Rights Movement, 1945 to the 1960s. Each interviewee is asked to discuss when or if she became a feminist, the women's movement during the period from World War II through the early 1960s, and her relationship to the National Women's Party (NWP).
Feminist and sociologist Barbara Eileen Ryan was educated at Southern Illinois University (BS 1976, MS 1978) and Washington University (PhD 1986). She was on the faculty of Widener University in Chester, Pennsylvania, from 1988 until her retirement in 2012. The author of Feminism and the Women's Movement: Dynamics of Change in Social Movement Activism and Ideology (1992) and Identity Politics in the Women's Movement (2001), Ryan wrote widely on social movements, social change, and sex and gender, among other topics. As part of her research she interviewed over forty feminists active in the women's movement and in the campaign for the Equal Rights Amendment. Some of these interviews are included in the collection.
Marlene Sanders is a television producer and correspondent. The collection includes a transcript of "Women's Liberation," a television program in the series NOW, broadcast by ABC on May 25, 1970; literature used in preparing the program; and letters from viewers received in response.
Mary Lee Sargent and Berenice Carroll were professors of women's studies (respectively) at Parkland College and the University of Illinois, both in Champaign, Illinois. In December 1981 they formed the Grassroots Group of Second Class Citizens to plan a series of direct actions in support of the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment. Illinois was one of three states needed for ERA ratification before the June 30, 1982 deadline. With the defeat of the ERA, the group went on to organize Women Rising in Resistance to continue the work of mobilizing and connecting activists committed to direct action nationally. The group continued to demonstrate for the rights of women and lesbians, as well as for peace and other causes, until 1992.
Feminist lawyer and educator Lynn Hecht Schafran studied art history at Smith College (B.A. 1962) and Columbia University (M.A. 1965) and later attended law school at Columbia (J.D. 1974), where she worked as a research assistant to Ruth Bader Ginsburg. From 1979 to 1981, Schafran was national director of the Federation of Women Lawyers Judicial Screening Panel. She has been director of Legal Momentum's National Judicial Education Program to Promote Equality for Women and Men in the Courts (NJEP) since 1981, and is also Senior Vice President of Legal Momentum.
Vice president for legislation of the National Organization for Women and a founder of the Buffalo, N.Y., chapter of NOW, Ann (London) Scott graduated from the University of Washington (B.A. 1952, Ph.D. 1970). A poet and translator, she was an editor of Poetry Northwest while in Seattle and taught English literature and composition at the State University of New York at Buffalo (1965-1972). After her election to NOW's national board in 1970, she devised much of the organization's lobbying strategy for the ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment and wrote about sex discrimination in business and at colleges and universities.
Smith was chair of the National Woman’s Party (NWP) from 1927-1929. This collection includes correspondence, speeches and articles by Smith; the NWP constitution, bylaws, minutes, financial documents, and publications; proposed legislation on equal rights; clippings on suffrage and women's rights; and photos. Most of the collection centers on the NWP, its campaign for women's equality, and Smith's special interest in the investment of NWP funds and the industrial equality of women in New York. Also included is information on the 1947 lawsuit within the NWP, other women's organizations, international women's activities, and suffrage in New York.
Doris Stevens (Oberlin, B.A., 1911) was active in organizations for the advancement of women both in the United States and internationally, in addition to being an author and composer. She was a suffrage organizer and a member of the National Woman's Party and the Lucy Stone League. She also served as chair of the Inter-American Commission of Women (1928-1939). In 1931 Stevens became the first woman member of the American Institute of International Law.
Suffragist Betty Gram Swing was born Myrtle Eveline Gram. With her sister Alice, she joined the women's rights movement in 1917 and was part of a group arrested for protesting the treatment of Alice Paul in prison. After her release, she joined the National Woman's Party as a national organizer and worked for the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment. Gram Swing lived in Washington, DC, Connecticut, and Vermont, where she worked with the Inter-American Commission of Women, and on behalf of the National Woman's Party to pass the Equal Rights Amendment. Correspondence, speeches, clippings, and printed material show Swing's work with the National Woman's Party, first as a "suffrage picket" who served jail time in 1917, and later as an advocate for the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment. Material documenting Gram Swing's work with international women's groups, such as the Six Point Group, the Inter-American Commission of Women, the World Woman's Party, and the League of Nations Consultative Committee on Nationality, shows the tight social circles of international women's rights activists, as well as the connections between national and international campaigns.
Consultant, administrator, and feminist Jane Horton Wells graduated from Texas Tech University (B.S. 1952). She was active in the Democratic Party beginning in the 1950s and worked as an administrator for the University of Texas and the YWCA. A founder of the Texas Women's Political Caucus, she was elected to the Texas State Board of Education in 1972 and later worked for the State Bar of Texas (1974-1976) and as national campaign manager for ERAmerica, an organization lobbying for the ratification of the ERA.
The Women's Equity Action League (WEAL) was a national membership organization, with state chapters and divisions, dedicated to improving the status and lives of all women by concentrating on economic advancement primarily through education, litigation, and legislation. Objecting to the National Organization for Women's (NOW) support of women's right to abortion, as well as to NOW's tactics of picketing and demonstrating in pursuit of its goals, Betty Boyer and other Ohio members of NOW founded WEAL in 1968. The organization advocated for the Equal Rights Amendment.